Users Meeting 2009

The biannual Danaos Users Meeting is a regular forum where the users meet, exchange ideas, learn about new developments and new products and provide their valuable feedback to the development teams.

Danaos commits to incorporate any user requests (adopted by the majority of attending users) to the future releases of the software free of charge.

The Users Meeting 2009 was successfully held during 8 – 11 December 2009. The Meeting started with the Opening Ceremony held at the Greek Yacht Club in Kastella, Piraeus on 8th December. Further workshops took place over the next 3 days at Danaos new premises on Akti Kondyli. About 300 shipping professionals from 120 shipping companies attended the opening ceremony and the meetings. Danaos presented the new initiatives aiming to assist its customers to comply with the challenges faced by the shipping industry, such as:

• Danaos Software offered as a Service Danaos is a joint venture partner in Virtual Maritime Services S.A. (VMS), a new company that offers Danaos and Microsoft software in a low-cost “pay as you go” monthly rental model. For more details visit:  http://www.vmssa.com
• Cooperation with Microsoft Hellas As part of the partnership with VMS, Danaos is also cooperating with Microsoft and is also anticipating an expansion of that cooperation in other areas related to IT Product and Services for the maritime industry.
• In cooperation with NewsLink Services (who have large experience in seafarer attitudes and needs and also great knowledge in the development of electronic training materials for seagoing staff), Danaos has developed a Computer-Based Training DVD initially for the Danaos onboard modules, to be expanded later into personalized CBT material to comply with the individual procedures and policies of each shipping company.
• Cooperation with Lloyd’s Register To assist its customers in complying with the TMSA requirements Danaos, in cooperation with Lloyd’s Register and G.P. Innovatech, has implemented an integrated packaged service that includes software, training and consultancy services.
• Regarding Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, Danaos (who’s customers include 18 out of 26 Greek US & UK-listed shipping companies for the Financial applications and who have successfully passed SOX audits using the Danaos package) has implemented a rich array of financial controls embedded in the software.
• Cooperation with ShipServ Danaos has established an interface with the leading maritime electronic procurement portal SHIPSERV who link over the web buyers and suppliers for an impressive optimization of the procurement process.
• Danaos Info@Gate, the leading communications suite has been expanded further to include additional mobile phone connectivity (Blackberry, iPhone, Windows Mobile), SIP Telephony, and a completion of the integration with the other Danaos applications.
• Danaos SeaRoutes, is the leading vessel routing service that combines detailed vessel sea-keeping characteristics with very accurate weather predictions, charter party details and market conditions in order to achieve optimal fuel consumption of maximum vessel utilization.

Danaos has also announced 42 new customer successful implementations in the past two years including 4 major projects for government-owned shipping companies. One of them, PRISCO (SINGAPORE) PTE LTD (see http://www.prisco.ru/eng) have made the following comments after attending the Users Meeting:

First off, thank you for inviting us to the Danaos User Meeting 2009 event which we found both interesting and beneficial to us as a company.

It was indeed interesting to see how Danaos evolved over the past few years, what other users are doing and where PRISCO is on this ever-changing landscape.

It was very exciting to meet the developers and all other people behind Danaos applications, discuss and hear their views on where Danaos will be heading in the future.

Last but not least, it was great to see the old friends from Danaos, spend some time with them and also make new friends along the way.

In short, we found Danaos User Meeting 2009 a success and are looking forward to participating in such events in the future.
Thank you.

Kind Regards,
Oliver Small
IT Systems
PRISCO (Singapore)

The Opening Ceremony presentations are available for download as per below:

Danaos Policies – Danaos / Dimitris Theodossiou
User’s views – Olympic Shipping & Ammitec / Achilleas Choursoglou
SeaWorthy Software – Gourdomichalis & Ammitec / Tassos Makris
Implementing Danaos – Sicuro / Dr. Konstantinos Rokkos
User Experience – Kuwait Oil Tanker Co. / Khalil Al Qallaf
New Danaos initiatives – Danaos / Panagiotis Nomikos
Hosting Maritime IT Systems – VMS / Nikos Nikolinakos
Microsoft Software Plus Services – Microsoft Hellas / George Vrellos
Computer Based Training – NewsLink / Ioannis Athanassopoulos
Danaos Future Plans - Danaos / Dimitris Theodossiou
Leveraging IT for Controls Optimization – PWC / Stan Voulanas
Integrated TMSA Services – Lloyd’s Register / Ioannis Iakovou
Web-based Procurement – ShipServ / Lars Brautshaug
Communication Solutions – Danaos / Nikos Spanos

Photos from the user meeting of December 2009: